Florence Mahoney and Mike Gorman waited patiently for weeks in Washington for the
bill to finally come up on the floor, in the hope that we could get a floor
amendment. The leaders had been waiting for the return of Senator Knowland, who was a
member of the Appropriations Committee. He had gone home for his mother's funeral and
had stayed longer than expected. When he returned, it turned out that he was the one
who led the opposition to increase funds for the institutes.

Q:

And you had expected him to be an ally?

Lasker:

Yes. We'd expected that he'd go along.

Q:

He was the minority floor leader.

Lasker:

Yes. Just why, I don't know, except that he was a Republican and he felt he had to
lead an economy drive. McKeller, too, was destructive on the floor.

Q:

Was that Kenneth McKeller from Tennessee? Was he still there?

Lasker:

Yes.

Bridges, as I said, tried to be helpful, but he did not do the same kind of job he
did for us in '49, when it was really he who put over the additional appropriations
for Cancer and Heart.